How do drugs from Mexico enter the U.S.?

Customs and Border Protection works to stop drugs coming from Mexico by land, sea, air and even tunnel.

(Photo: Nick Oza/USA TODAY NETWORK)

How do drugs from Mexico enter the U.S.?
Much of the illegal drug trafficking intercepted by U.S. Customs and Border Protection isn’t coming over a fence. It happens at the nation’s ports of entry. Usually drugs are found hidden in cars or trucks entering the United States.

During the 2016 fiscal year, CBP agents seized 246,000 kilograms of marijuana, meth, cocaine and heroin at southwest ports of entry compared with 589,000 kilograms outside ports of entry.
The sheer volume of vehicular traffic at the ports can make finding drugs challenging. For example, San Diego, the busiest land crossing in the country, sees more than 40 million cars pass through each year.
When drugs are smuggled outside the ports of entry, they are either transported through underground tunnels, boats traveling off the Pacific coast, or by people trekking through remote areas. Experts say tunnels are used for heavy loads that are repackaged and loaded onto trucks and shipped throughout the U.S.

Footprints in the sand led Tucson and Yuma Sector Border Patrol agents to a series of arrests where illegal aliens carried 1,400 pounds of marijuana into southern Arizona.

Early Monday morning, agents assigned to the Ajo Station began tracking a group of drug mules who had crossed the border in Gila Bend. The agents observed the group carrying large backpacks as they marched through the desert, information obtained from Tucson Sector Public Affairs Spokesman Jack Loudermilk revealed.

Agents caught up with the group as they entered a wash near Main Street in Gila Bend. As agents approached the group, the “drug mules” dropped their backpacks and fled into town. Agents recovered 33 bundles of marijuana weighing 690 pounds. A K-9 agent helped in the recovery effort.

The migrants fled the scene and have yet to be apprehended, Loudermilk stated. Officials estimated the street value of the marijuana to be $345,000.

That same morning, agents assigned to the Welton Border Patrol Station tracked the footprints of nine individuals. Agents caught up with the group near Tacna. The mules carried backpacks containing 340 pounds of marijuana. Agents arrested the smugglers and seized the drugs.

Later that day, agents assigned to the Welton Station’s Camp Grip operating base found more than 370 pounds of marijuana. Smugglers apparently abandoned the drugs south of Dateland.

Agents processed the illegal aliens according to Tucson Sector policies. Federal authorities filed criminal complaints against those arrested with the backpacks of marijuana.

Officials estimated the 710 pounds of marijuana seized in these two incidents to be worth more than $350,000, Loudermilk stated.

Coast Guard officials said that with the drugs that will be offloaded Wednesday — worth nearly $680 million — the agency has now seized more than 455,000 pounds of drugs in fiscal year 2017, breaking the previous record of 443,000 pounds seized in fiscal year 2016 . . .

WATCH Record-breaking year in cocaine seizures for the Coast GuardMiles off the coast of California, a Customs and Border Protection aircraft armed with high-powered surveillance cameras locked in on a tiny object glimmering in the horizon. Suspicious, authorities zoomed in closer and observed a triangular submarine-like vessel operating almost completely underwater to avoid observation and radar.
The Coast Guard Cutter Steadfast was dispatched to intercept the suspected smuggling boat.
It’s been a record year for high seas drug seizures like these — 50,000 pounds of cocaine and heroin valued at more than a half-a-billion dollars have been confiscated since August.DOJMiles off the coast of California, a U.S. Coast Guard ship was dispatched to intercept a submarine-like vessel with millions of dollars' worth of cocaine on board, allegedly bound for the U.S. more +

A record $6 billion dollars in drugs have been intercepted this year and nearly 600 suspected traffickers were arrested and turned over to federal authorities for prosecution, according to the U.S. Coast Guard and Department of Justice.
On Wednesday, the Coast Guard offloaded 50,550 pounds of cocaine and heroin worth an estimated $679.3 million in San Diego, CA. This morning's offload, which was attended by Attorney General Jeff Sessions, was the result of 25 separate seizures conducted by four Coast Guard cutters and a Navy ship, which began on Aug. 2, 2017.
"We are facing a challenge in this country with drug abuse, addiction like we've never seen before," said Sessions.Sessions credited this rise to the availability, purity and low price of illicit drugs.
Including today's offload, more than 455,034 pounds of cocaine, worth over $6.1 billion,has been intercepted by the Coast Guard in Fiscal Year 2017, which topped the 2016 record of 443,000 pounds.
Nearly 600 suspected smugglers were apprehended by the Coast Guard and turned over to federal authorities for prosecution in the U.S. during the year. That's up from 465 suspects in 2016 and 373 in fiscal year 2015.
Commandant Admiral Paul Zukunft said Wednesday that while the Coast Guard is "getting better" at intercepting these drug boats, there is also increase in cultivation and production, particularly in Colombia.
Most of the cocaine consumed here in the United States originates in Colombia, according to the Coast Guard.
"Last year, we had 60,000 fatalities due to drug usage [in the U.S.] and that number will only go up next year," said Zukunft while making the case for the need for a bigger Coast Guard.
Back on that August day, out at sea, the camera picked up four passengers who glow as if radioactive. Soon teams of heavily armed members of the Coast Guard surrounded the semi-submersible or so-called narco submarine and the suspects raised their hands in the air — the result of a joint Coast Guard, CBP and Drug Enforcement Administration investigation.
On board the suspected smuggler’s vessel, more than 3 tons of cocaine — millions of dollars' worth — is found, allegedly bound for the U.S.

The increase in criminal activities has been reflected in the seizures made by state officials where drug cartels have resorted to primarily using large shipping trucks and passenger buses to conceal their actions. . .